Killer who robbed man he met on bondage website jailed as judge says he used suicide note as 'ruse'

A Sydney killer who absconded from a psychiatric hospital and robbed a man he had met on a bondage website has been jailed for at least two-and-a-half years, with a judge saying he used a suicide note as a "ruse" and misled authorities.

Trent Jennings, 27, admitted three charges after absconding from a psychiatric facility at Morisset near Newcastle in December 2011.

He had been deemed suitable for day release from the facility to attend drug counselling and educational courses in Newcastle.

But instead on December 29, he went to the Zetland home of a 50-year-old man he'd met on the website, carrying a backpack containing sex aids and the drug amyl nitrite.

After the man asked to be tied up, Jennings stole his black Mercedes-Benz four-wheel-drive, which had an iPod and iPad inside, and organised $400 to be deposited to his bank account. He later drove to the NSW north coast.

After a major statewide hunt, police found him asleep in the Mercedes-Benz near Byron Bay on January 4, 2012.

Judge Maiden said Jennings had left a suicide note at the Morisset facility for his parents, saying he was going to Bali to kill himself because he couldn't bear not knowing when he would be released into the community.

"I have made the decision because I can no longer deal with what has happened in my life," the note said.

The note was a cover-up for what he was really planning to do, Judge Maiden found.

"That document, in my mind, was a ruse."

In sentencing at Downing Centre District Court, Judge Peter Maiden said Jennings abused the trust of the nursing staff at the Morisset facility.

"A person who does that must expect to be used in the criminal justice system as an example of what will not be tolerated," Judge Maiden said.

"This man at the time of these offences was, on the face of it ... mentally stable and as such I propose to deal with him as a criminal."

Judge Maiden said he had some sympathy for Jennings because of his mental health background, but at the time he absconded he was judged to be well and wasn't medicated.

In 2003 Jennings, then 18, killed Giuseppe Vitale during a drug-induced psychosis, tying up his hands and feet and stabbing him in the neck.

Jennings was found not guilty of murdering Mr Vitale because a court concluded he was in a drug-induced psychosis at the time, and he was dealt with under mental health laws.

Judge Maiden said the meet-up with his 2011 victim had similarities to that case, because both involved bondage, a website and the use of the drug.

"It seems to this court that's relevant to understand the circumstances that gave rise to these three matters."

After being caught by police in January 2012, Jennings pleaded guilty to the charges of dishonestly obtaining financial advantage by deception, car theft and stealing from a dwelling.

Judge Maiden sentenced him to a maximum of three-and-a-half years' jail.

With time already served, he will be eligible for parole on July 3, 2014.

He will still be subject to the Mental Health Tribunal for the 2003 killing after he serves time for the latest charges.